CHIPS Ponch and John help a family in trouble
by susan cousineau
Summary: This is the story of Ponch and John and how they help a family involved in child trafficking.


Ponch and John had been partners for many years, always on their motorcycles and always driving the expressways of Los Angeles. Time went by, cars changed, but people were always the same. There was good in everyone, but sometimes the bad would come out and when that happened Ponch and John went to work.  
Each morning all officers met with the captain and went over their daily assignments. The freeways were always the same, but each patrol officer was assigned to a particular route. They would ride in groups of two and ride back and forth over the same area over and over. They each would have a dispatcher and carried a cell phone with several apps designed to help them in their job with the public. GPS was always on so that if either of them got into any trouble the other motorcycle police officers could find them immediately.  
Today both Ponch and John would be assigned to sector fourteen, a long stretch of freeway that was known for speed and danger. It was where the freeway was straight, but unfortunately  
had a lot of construction. When there was a lot of construction people tended to go too fast as they drove through putting the construction workers and themselves in danger.  
As they pulled onto the freeway they saw that the day was going to be long and hot, already traffic was backed up for over five miles and tempers were flaring. Sometimes if an officer would lead the back upped traffic the traffic would start to run a little smoother. Both Ponch and John went to the end of the construction and started to lead the traffic. After two hours, with the lightening of traffic and their skill, finally the traffic had started to travel at a better rate of speed,  
At about 10:30 that morning they had been riding with just the normal amount of tickets and things when they spotted an old camper at a rest area. They approached the trailer and looked around for some sign that there were people around it. They knocked at the door and a small child answered. He did not speak english and it was not spanish. Ponch and John soon found out that the young child was speaking dutch.  
Since the child was no older than seven or eight years old, it was the duty of the police to put him in social services custody. As Ponch and John entered the clean but filled trailer, they heard  
a noise. When they entered the back of the home they found an infant girl no older than three months.  
Seeing neglected children had always been one of the toughest parts of being an officer of the law. It was hard for John and Ponch to deal with these situations. After all they were both fathers and took their roles of parenthood very seriously.  
John picked up the little girl and gave her a hug. A social worker had already come to the trailer and took the baby from his arms. The child looked well fed and cared for. She was clean, Ponch and John knew that she had not been left alone for long.  
It had not been more than twenty minutes when a car pulled up with the children's mother. She was distraught and could not understand why the police had been called to her trailer/ It was in a safe spot and she had only gone to the store. Her english was poor, but she was very verbal that she felt that she had done nothing wrong. The children had been safe. Her son was old enough to stay with her little girl, after all he was nine.  
There was a law that said that children could not be left alone, but it depended very much on the circumstances and whether or not the children were cared for and also how long they had been alone.  
Ponch and John took a look at the lady and asked her about her trailer and where she was headed. She told them that she and her family had left from Las Vegas two weeks ago. Her husband had lost his job and they had headed to LA to stay at her brothers, and get a better job. But when they had arrived at her brothers the landlord wouldn't let them park the trailer in their yard. So, they had to park in the rest area, because they didn't have the money to put the trailer into a trailer park. Her husband was out looking for a job and she was sure that he would be returning to his family soon.  
All of the officers knew that this lady and her children could not stay at a rest area for long. It was illegal for them to stay there overnight, and there would be no place for the family to get water and get rid of waste in the trailer. It would soon be a health hazard in the trailer for the children, so they had to do something right away.  
It was decided that through an emergency fund, the family could be relocated for up to the next thirty days at a trailer park down the street. Ponch and John would have to keep an eye out for the father to come home. When the father returned home, he could connect his car to the trailer and he and his family could be safe once more.  
Sure enough when three pm came the father returned home to the trailer and was surprised to find the police waiting for him. He was very thankful to the police for finding them a safe place to stay. He was sure that he would find a job soon, and that they would soon not have to take the charity that had been offered. He promised that all money would be paid back as soon as his luck took a change for the good.  
Both Ponch and John felt good about the little family, and had been happy that they were able to help them out in a time of need. Social services would be keeping in close contact with the family and with that they felt that their job was done.  
It had been a very hot day, in the nineties with no breeze and the two partners were glad to get back onto their bikes. When you got onto a bike the breeze would cool you down, even in hot weather the bike would create a breeze.  
Not two minutes into the ride did Ponch and John see an accident. It was a nasty accident involving a large truck with a load of new cars and several other cars. The large truck had swerved to avoid a car that had tried to pull into the other lane in the construction and had lost control. The new cars were on their side and one had landed right on top of one of the other cars.  
Ponch and John went immediately to the aid of the people. The accident was a mess with many people sitting in their cars in a state of shock. When they came around to the side of a honda civic they found that a young child was trapped in the back seat. It did not appear that the child was injured but there was smoke coming from the bottom of the car.  
It was necessary for them to get the little boy out right away before the car caught on fire. Ponch pulled the metal that was around the boy. It was very hot and took out his pocket knife. With his knife he cut the seat belt from the child and gave one mighty yank He could now feel the hot flames consuming the vehicle and he knew that time was of the essence. . With that he got the little boy. He then turned around and ran from the car. Just as he got about ten feet away the flames engulfed the car. Just one minute later and the news would not have been good..  
Meanwhile John had been working on helping the people who were trapped upside down in the car that was under the new car that had fallen off of the truck. No one in the car was hurt but the lady and her two children were scared to death and crying. With the help of four men who had seen the accident and the driver of the truck, they had been able to roll the new car off of the car with all of the occupants. Once this was done they had pulled all of the occupants out of the car and taken them to safety.  
Ponch and John looked at the accident with amazement. There had been five cars involved in the accident, but there had been no serious injuries. Six people had been sent to the hospital, but it appeared fortunately that none of the injuries had been life threatening.  
By the time Ponch and John had finished with the accident scene their day was over and they had headed back to the police station. It had been a good day all together and tomorrow would bring another day.  
The next morning at the meeting they were informed that the family that they had helped was doing well and had been all set up in the trailer park. It had turned out that their father had been a good car salesman in Las Vegas, it was just that the company that he had been working at had gone out of business. Ponch and John were sure that the family was going to make it, the family just needed a little assistance.  
Ponch and John had once again been given the same assignment that they had been given the day before. It would be another day of working around the construction and keeping a good eye on the freeway and the stories of the people that were using the road that day.  
Once they arrived on the freeway it was not long that again trouble was brewing around the construction zone. People were always trying to go around the safety barrels, so that they could get where they needed to go faster and sure enough up ahead a man in a white mustang was trying to do that when he nearly caused a freeway pile up.  
Ponch and John turned on their lights and siren and headed toward the man in the mustang. He was in no mood to stop and swerved in and out of traffic trying his best to lose the chips officers who were pursuing him.  
As happens many times when cars go too fast and the driver has no intention of doing what is right for everyone else on the road, the driver lost control. He went up an embankment had landed on his side and then rolled down the hill.  
Ponch and John both got off of their bikes and ran to the mustang. The driver wasn't moving and once again fire was always a danger in this kind of accident. John had requested an ambulance and Ponch was attempting to open the drivers side door, when again they smelled the smoke. It was coming from the bottom of the engine and John immediately started to apply the fire extinguisher that they always carried with them. Ponch was still trying to free the man when the emt s arrived and took over. It was their turn then to direct traffic around the scene.  
Because they had witnessed the accident and had been in pursuit of the subject when he had crashed it was the policy of the police department to have the officers fill out the accident report right away. That meant more time at the station and many questions.  
They both arrived at the station and filled out all of the necessary papers and answered the questions that were sent to them via email of all things. Times are changing Ponch thought.  
For the next week everything had been quite boring, with the usual accidents and car stops when they again came across the trailer with the family that they had set up in the trailer park back in the same rest area.  
This time when Ponch and John knocked on the door they found the mother alone with the two children. Her husband had not come home in three days and she was so afraid for him that she had decided to take the children and head to her mothers in Monterey.  
Since John and Ponch knew that the trailer was hers and that the wife now had the car to pull it legally they had nothing that they could do to stop the lady from taking her children up in the north. They just wondered where was the husband? He didn't take the car, she had it connected to the trailer, and it was now pulling such trailer. Something was not right with the situation and John asked if he could go inside.  
When the door was opened he saw why the lady was so nervous, there were two strange men now standing in the kitchen of the home. They didn t have the appearance of two men who you would consider friendly, in fact they looked very threatening to both Ponch and John.  
"I am sorry sir, do you have any identification?" Ponch asked the men.  
With that the men got up quickly and appeared to be perhaps gong for a gun, so Ponch and John acted quickly and handcuffed the two men. Neither Ponch or John were surprised to find that both men were from Las Vegas and they were looking for money that the husband owed some of the casinos in Las Vegas.  
Now, they were wondering where the husband was. These men were taking this family someplace. Ponch and John looked all around the trailler and could not find the father. The two children were safe in the back bedroom but no father.  
Ponch and John again talked to the wife who was very hesitant to tell them anything. It was obvious that she was scared. With a lot of gentle coaching she finally admitted that her husband was at her brothers hiding.  
Ponch told her that she needed to go back to the trailer park and stay. It was what was best for her children, and that driving up and down the coastline with a trailer and two children was dangerous. He knew that she waasn't going to Monterey she was just running away.  
Both Ponch and John knew that if these people owed enough money for the heavies to come out and find them that the family was in grave danger. Perhaps there was something else involved , drugs or something of the sort.  
When John had gone to the back bedroom to check for the children he had been surprised by the child on the bed. He knew that babies grew and changed, but he was sure that the child was not the same child that he had seen just two weeks before. This child had too much hair and seemed to be younger than the little girl that had been with them just last week.  
He then asked Ponch and they both agreed that the child did not look like the same little girl that they had just seen. This child was younger and much darker, while the other baby had a lighter complexion and blue eyes. They knew that they would need to look a little harder into the family that they were dealing with. Something was wrong.  
When Ponch and John arrived back at the station, they went to the captain with their suspicions . Both of them were sure that the baby had not been the same baby and they were wondering why the mob would have been so interested in this couple.  
They were not surprised when an fbi agent knocked on the door. They had been looking long and hard for a couple from Las Vegas who had been involved in infantile trafficking. They had been following a ring of kidnapers who were stealing children and then selling them on the black market. Many of the children had come from the eastern Europe area would be sent to the west coast of the United States, where desperate families would adopt the children at a very high price.  
When Ponch and John had arrived at the trailer park that afternoon they had found the trailer, but it was empty. There was no one there and there were signs that the people had left in a hurry. Somehow the two officers were sure that the lady was not a willing participant and they needed to find her right away.  
They spoke to the manager who told them that the lady with two children had left in a rental car about an hour ago. He had been suspect of what was going on and had written down their license plate number. This was the break that the two officers needed. Ponch immediately sent the information out over the radio and with that Ponch and John left again for the freeway.  
They had been on the road for about twenty minutes when the call came over the radio. The children and the lady had been found just twenty miles north of the trailer park, again like the rest of the traffic in California stuck in construction. This time the woman had been non cooperative and had tried to run from the officers.  
When the lady and the two children arrived at the station Ponch and John were waiting for her. "Miss you need to tell us the truth. You cannot keep running from whatever you are running from. We suspect that you might be involved in the trafficking of children. The people that you work for are dangerous and you and your husband are in grave danger." Ponch told her.  
The lady cried and then explained. "We came here three years ago. It was very hard neither of us spoke much english and we were cold and hungry. A friend of ours told us about a group of people who would pay us good money to take care of children who were waiting to be adopted. The man came over to us and explained that sometimes children come from another country and that their parents sometimes do not want the children. He told us that what he needed was loving people who would take care of the children until the proper adoptive parents could be found.  
My husband and I took care of about eight different children, and the man would come and get them about every thirty days. Then one day a lady came to our home. She had followed her missing baby half way around the world and she had traced her to me. It was then that we found out that we were actually trafficking these children. We didn't know what to do and when we told the man that we no longer wanted to help him he threatened us. We left Las Vegas in a hurry hoping that we could escape but they found us." she told them.  
"What is the name of the man who paid you to take care of these children?" John asked her.  
"His name was Hugo, I don't know his last name." she replied.  
The man from the fbi had been standing in the doorway and said "Hugo Pozlensky, yes I know him well. He has been involved in child kidnaping for years. We have just never been able to prove anything and he has run free for years Where is your husband now?"  
"I don't know. I haven't seen him since yesterday and Hugo says that I will never see him again if I speak to the police. I am so frightened he is in such danger." she cried.  
"We will do all that we can for you We will put you and your family in a safe house and we will protect them. Are the children yours?" the agent asked her.  
"My son who is nine is mine, the little girl is one of the children that are going to be given to some american parents. Hugo is to meet me tonight and the exchange of this infant was to take place tonight." she told them.  
"You need not worry mam. We will help you." the agent told her. "What I want to know, are you interested in helping out with the capture of this man? Hopefully, with your help we can save your husband's life also." the agent told her.  
So it was set up she was to go back to the trailer without the children. Ponch and John would stay close by and the agent would be located in the trailer. When Hugo came they would bre ready.  
The phone call came as was expected and the polish lady handed the call like a trooper. "I insist that I speak to my husband before you come to my home. You promised me that you would return him when I gave you the child. I want to talk to him." she demanded.  
"You are in no position to demand anything." he retorted.  
"If I don't speak to my husband now I will not be cooperative in the delivery of this baby. This is a profitable business for me and my family and I want to continue with the practice of helping families find the children. If it is done like it has been being done, I am not against continuing as was. It is my husband who is opposed to the continuation of the jobs." she told him.  
After a few minutes Hugo had allowed her to speak to her husband and all was set. He would be with Hugo and if the baby was delivered as planned all would go well. The two hours that passed before Hugo had shown up at the trailer park seemed like days to the agent in the trailer and to Ponch and John who were waiting around the corner. But, as planned Hugo and the ladies husband had shown up. When he had walked into the trailer he was met with a big surprise, and was placed under arrest.  
Two weeks later Hugo talked and with the information that he provided a large part of the infant selling ring was closed down.  
Ponch and John stopped by the trailer to check on their friends. The father had found a job at a good car dealership and their son was now attending school. Things were going to be ok with their new friends.


End file.
